People

People

Bionic Handler Dan Peterson is the personal trainer for 28 Silicon Valley residents – including his dentist, a stripper, and 26 high tech bigwigs. "I work out everyone from VCs to VPs – Kevin Harvey, Joe Graziano. Ever since Mike Homer stopped coming, he has been getting comments about his weight." His clientele, Peterson admits, "won't be running a marathon anytime soon, but except for stress, they're in good shape." Still, the fitness guru, who is finishing a master's degree in organizational psychology and plans to become an executive coach, thinks the execs could use a new emotional regimen. "A lot of them are manic-depressive," Peterson says with the reassuring timbre of a personal trainer-cum-psyche soother. "They keep their serotonin high by cutting deals." As to the nature of those deals, he is mum: "I'm held to strict nondisclosure."

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Company Man
When Philippe Kahn, the flamboyant head of Starfish Software, sold his outfit to Motorola, some cynics suggested that he was looking to cash in. Not so, he insists. "I'm going to make Motorola the global leader in wireless," Kahn modestly declares. "It's not a job – it's a mission." His new position as a special adviser on technology at Motorola seems rather understated for Kahn, who's not the type to be buried on an org chart. But he's showing a renewed joie de vivre: "I get to work with technology, which is the fun stuff." The 46-year-old, who used to rival Bill Gates as the most public persona in high tech, is showing signs of mellowing. "Every time I get caught in the hype trap," he says, "I get into trouble."

Hyper Spaceman
Earthlings have only recently, with the introduction of radio and TV, become detectable to aliens," offers Clifford Pickover, a staff scientist at IBM's T. J. Watson Research Center. "It's sobering to think that the early sign of terrestrial intelligence might come from the mouth of Bart Simpson." Pickover, who develops apps for the IntelliStation, holds nine user interface patents, and writes Discover magazine's "Brain-Boggler" column, clearly isn't a one-note researcher. During the last eight years, he has published 20 books – including sci-fi novels and psychology, math, and natural science texts. And his tally will grow by five this year with the release of The Science of Aliens in October. "Some people golf in their spare time. Instead," Pickover deadpans, "I write."

Palm Player
So you're Donna Dubinsky, president of Palm Computing, which introduced the PalmPilot – one of the most successful hardware launches ever, with 1 million units sold in its first 18 months. What do you do now? In inimitable Valley fashion, you split. Dubinsky is off to "create a company that'll be a player in the handheld industry." With Jeff Hawkins, Palm's former chief technologist, she has formed an as-yet-unnamed venture. The duo intends to license the Palm OS and create a product akin to the Pilot – but for the consumer market. When pressed for details, Dubinsky demurs: "It's a piece of hardware, and we're interested in the consumer space – gameplay and education and such."

Nerd Herder Robert X. Cringely first cruised his '66 T-Bird into the spotlight in 1995 when he traveled America to interview the likes of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates for Triumph of the Nerds. This November, the former InfoWorld columnist returns to PBS with Nerds 2.0.1: A Brief History of the Internet. "The first time, we missed the Internet, and I'd like to get it right this time," he says of the sequel, which features insights from Bob Taylor, Sandy Lerner, Don Valentine, and other Net pioneers. "We filmed at 100 locations," he says, setting up a well-scripted punch line: "There were only two places our radio mikes didn't work because of interference – the Pentagon and Bill Gates's new house."

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